Building a house in a rural area

Building in rural Newfoundland will be quite different from building on Vancouver Island. It's difficult to give advice without knowing an approximate location. Also, what services are provided and what services do you require?

One thing that is often overlooked is fire protection. In a rural area fire departments are mostly volunteer departments. There are different levels of protection: there's "Hydrant Protection" (a hydrant within 1000 feet of your house), "Tender Protection" (the fire department brings water with them) and no protection. For insurance purposes, if you're within hydrant protection, say your premium is $1,000/year. If you're in tender protection, it will be twice as much, or $2,000. If you have no protection, it will be at least 4 times as much, or $4,000. Every year. If you're not in a protected area, a nearby fire department will not respond if your house burns as it opens them up to liability if they commit resources to you and someone in the protected area (who pays taxes for coverage) has a problem and response is delayed. You typically can't get a mortgage without fire insurance. Some insurers and unwilling to insure unprotected buildings period.

smacd wrote: ↑ Building in rural Newfoundland will be quite different from building on Vancouver Island. It's difficult to give advice without knowing an approximate location. Also, what services are provided and what services do you require?

This

OP, see you are new to the RFD Forums
So do yourself a favour and update your profile so there is location shown
(Like mine says Eastern Ontario … and @smacd has The Kootenays )

Your location being noted will save you a lot of grief / aggravation plus back & forth needlessness

You can use your Province, Region, nearby Big City, or Hometown
Anything that will give others a sense of place
As RFD is a Canadawide website with Millions of Cdns posting from NFLD to BC, and Pointe Pelee to Iqualuit (and beyond)

Always helpful therefore to understand another RFDers POV / perspective
(Example … Building Codes are Provincial, Building Permits are Municipal, etc. Differs greatly place to place)

If you have to rely on RFD with this - buy from the builder / resale home. This forum is good for coupons on marble cheese, but house construction is totally different gane.